Review: 'Into the Woods'

by Douglas James

Warning: SPOILERS below!

Another year, another massive PGS musical. And it’s another cracker. A brilliant showcase of talent from the precision and unfaltering job done by the techs, the wonderful soundtrack from the orchestra and the singers, the incredibly directing and of course the superb acting. I was lucky enough to get the view from the backstage before I saw the play, and the Into the Woods cast runs like a well-oiled machine or a new engine, or an Olympic runner… or… you get the picture. Just a quick warning to those who haven’t seen it yet and plan to, spoilers ahead, come back when you’ve seen it!

Into the Woods was a play written by James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim and combines a whole bunch of fairy tales into one story. You’ve got Little Red Riding Hood, Jack and the Beanstalk, Cinderella, Rapunzel and more. It plays with the idea of all of this happening in the same world, and the story not ending when it seems like it does.

It starts off by introducing all these characters in a lovely song and follows the Baker (Joe Brennan) and the Baker’s Wife (Poppy Goad) through their quest to find ingredients for a potion that would allow them to have a child. Luckily enough, these ingredients were essentially found in Jack’s cow, Red Riding Hood’s cape, Cinderella’s slipper, and a bit of Rapunzel’s hair. Throughout this, problems arise, as they always do, and one of these problems is the relationship of the Baker and his wife. This bond between characters was superbly acted, not only showing strain in their relationship, but also almost managing to convince even me that they had been married for a couple of decades, through just simple looks, gestures, and through brilliant comedic timing from both, really bringing the musical alive. Unfortunately, once the potion is taken and everything seems fine, we realise that everything… well… isn’t. In a disastrous turn of events for our brave heroes (and villains), the giant (you know, the one that Jack slayed) had a wife, and she comes down to ground level looking for revenge. The fairy tale characters start arguing, the Witch (Loren Dean) tries desperately to keep control even without her powers, they accidentally kill the apparently touchless Narrator (Daniel Hill) in a brilliant twist where they all turn on him and the giant’s wife steps on him, and the Baker’s wife gets a bit too friendly with Cinderella’s Prince (Barney Carter) and then dies herself. I know, utter chaos. In the end, the witch storms off, so Cinderella (Cordelia Hobbs) gets some birds to blind the giant who is then tricked into falling into pitch and killing it with Jack (Saskia Quarrie-Jones) and Red Riding Hood (Tillie Moore, Jazzy Holden and Sofia Callander). Whew. I mean, I didn’t even cover everything in that, just the Baker’s story really. This is a play that is filled to the brim with characters and story, and immensely complicated musical that was done marvelously and without fault.

From the completely batty but brilliantly funny grandmother played by Susie Shlosberg to the scarily vicious wolf played by Ben Cranny-Whitehead with a worryingly hungry obsession and the strict but worried and loving mother of Jack played by Emily Whitehead to the Stepmother and two Stepsisters played By Alex Dassow, Jean-Mickael Hopkinson and Oliver Saunders that added hilarity and fantastic comedy moments to some scenes. I feel like I’ll always be disappointed when seeing another Stepmother in another play, as no one does it quite like Alex Dassow. And those were just the side characters, the ones who didn’t quite make it into the band of heroes, or the ingredients for the potion. Cordelia Hobbs gave an outstanding singing performance as Cinderella, and Daniel Hill brought on a story like presence on stage whenever he walked on, until he’s squished of course. Speaking of squish and presence, the often difficult-to-master Witch was perfected by Loren Dean, whether the spotlight was on her, or she was just behind everyone being creepy. Supported by the rest of the cast and their terrifying reactions to this devilish creature, the Witch changed from the scary villain in the first half to the merciless and cunning leader of the group of fairy-tale characters. I didn’t think it could get any worse until the giant played by India Stewart-Evans turned up and boomed her commanding voice throughout the theatre looking for Jack. Jack was brilliantly played by Saskia Quarrie-Jones, who managed to superbly capture the care-not boyish attitude of the giant slayer.

There’s just too much talent to list in Into the Woods, but the unconventional choices made by the directors really put an interesting spin to some of the aspects of the show. Little Red Riding Hood was played by three different girls, each of them showing the worryingly changeable states of this seemingly innocent girl, Tillie, Jazzy and Sofia almost managed to turn Red Riding Hood into a villain, until luckily steering her back into goodness in time for the end of the musical.  No one is more strangely mysterious than Sacha Hemingway in a dark suit, or more condescending than Finn Elliot with a cane. The casting for this play was spot on. The idea of the ensemble enhances the stage and atmosphere in the piece, and Mr Robinson has done a fantastic job of making the whole piece flow like a chocolate waterfall. Or a river. Whatever flows more. However, it is a musical, and no musical like this would be complete without such a brilliant archestra providing an almost constant soundtrack to the piece, to create tension, and evoke a host of other emotions.

If you’re reading this and the show’s still on, go and see it. Book your tickets now. I know it looks like I’ve listed all of the events and analysed all of the actors and their awesome talent, but I haven’t there is so much more the the play. It has happy moments, moving moments, and an underlying sense of dark comedy, helped on by a comedy cow played by Ray Leach and Becky Arnold. Now that sounds like I’m being rude. I’m not. It’s an actual cow.

Go and see for yourself.